Thanks for the help.
Seems like transferring the Membership Rewards points to an airline as miles is a much better deal than buying an airline ticket directly through Membership Rewards. If I transfer the points to Delta, I can buy a RT ticket to Tokyo and still have miles leftover, yet if I try to buy the ticket through Membership Rewards (they equate 1 point to $1), I dont have enough points for the same flight and have to actually pay a small amount to make up for the pts I'm short.
How does 30% compare to other recent point transfer offerings?
You can't combine miles and ecerts/coupons. But you can get a 30% bonus on your transfer from MR to Delta (check the AxEx credit card forum for a link or just do a google search).