I almost got hosed with the Delta.com flight protection a couple of weeks ago. My EWR-MSP was delayed by an hour and the Red Coat at the ticket counter was nice enough to put me on stand-by on the EWR-SLC flight and then confirm my connection from SLC all while keeping my EWR-MSP-XXX connection in place. When I got into the terminal I fired up the laptop to view the itinerary. What I saw was EWR-MSP (You may miss your connection) and then a Confirm the Following link for:
EWR-SLC-XXX in F

Naturally, I was excited - I can confirm both segments and be in F, why not! When I clicked the button, it removed the MSP connection as well as the stand-by on the EWR-SLC flight and only had me confirmed on SLC-XXX, not the EWR-SLC as the page had indiciated. I had to run up to the counter where a wonderful gate agent got it all squared away. And fortuantely she was able to get me onto the EWR-SLC flight and even paged me to ask which seat I would like.^

Lesson learned - don't touch Delta.com during IROPS.