In regards to your orignial post, I don't foresee a reclassification happening and I agree that it is likely beyond their control.
However, back in 2000, I was FO and I had my family coming to LAX from the East Coast to visit me. Two of my family members were on paid F tickets ($2000pp back then) and one of them was using an award ticket. The flight from ATL-LAX that 2 of the 3 were on had 0 award availability left, but plenty of F inventory. I called SMS and had a really nice supervisor "somehow" free up one of those F seats so that my grandmother could use it with her award. I have no idea how it happened and if it was because of my Medallion status or just a really nice Supervisor, but she did it for me.