Yes, but THIS year MM status is for all practical purposes NOT relevant for the purposes of upgrades. NEXT year it will be THE deciding factor.

I figure even if the overall UG rate for DMs is low, the probability for any given flight that at least one person will get upgraded is quite high, and if I'm on the top of the list of DM's, that person is going will be me.

Currently I always just pay for F, but why buy it if I'm going to get an upgrade almost all of the time..... especially if I can just rebook on F (on the same flight or on UA or AA) if it looks like the UG won't clear. (I buy F last minute all the time and IME it's almost never sold out until after the UGs start to clear.)