Thanks for the advice. I switched to coach and will save 25,000 miles (2 people x 12.5K). I figure that's enough for another RT and if I can get the emergency row, not bad. Hopefully, when I call AS for the seat assignment (you can only pick seats for the AA metal flights when booking on aa.com), they'll know about the policy change.

I think if it was a long flight AND I could get the equivalent of AA's NGB seats, I'd have opted for FC. But emergency row in coach is good enough.