Originally Posted by JY1024

Is your flight into AA international or domestic? If it's domestic, you should be fine. I'll sometimes get off my flight and head to the lounge to take a few calls. In that case, my luggage comes out on the carousel, goes around a few times, then AA grabs it and takes it to the luggage desk. Then when I'm ready, I head down to the luggage desk and show my bag claim ticket and/or ID to claim my bag. (Of course, there is slight risk of theft if your bag is just sitting there all lonely on the carousel. But I generally don't travel with anything too valuable in my checked bags, and I only do this on my last leg coming back home.)