AA has its problems just like United, Delta and Southwest have their problems. There are bitter pilots at all of them. You just happened to run into a bitter AA pilot. For every one of them there are ten that count their blessings despite the stuff that needs to be fixed... I’m one of them.
AA is a lot of things but “glorified regional” is not one of them, not even close. Our contract, while needing work, is still far better than any regional... Talk to the flow through guys and you’ll quickly get a laugh when you try to compare AA (or any legacy) to a regional. It’s an asinine comparison only brought forth by bitter pilots.