Thanks for the feedback. I almost did something like this last summer but decided to "save" the chit for another time. Glad I did as the price difference this time is huge.

Last summer I wanted to fly JFK-LAX. Flying JFK-SFO-BUR (Burbank) one-way was much cheaper than JFK-LAX. Also, flying JFK-LAX-SJC (San Jose) was cheaper than JFK-LAX (or JFK-SFO). No logic to this. The least expensive and most direct option would have me booking JFK-LAX-SJC and skipping the LAX-SJC part.

I ended up booking the JFK-SFO-BUR to save money, not skip a leg and save the "chit" for the future. When I got to JFK I tried to do a change but all the JFK-LAX flights were booked in economy. So I flew to SFO and when I got there went to a gate flying to LAX (instead of waiting hours for the scheduled BUR flight). They put me on the LAX flight with no problem so it worked out in the end, except for the SFO detour.