The last time I checked, your premier league thread is self moderated.
Do moderators still pay much attention to a self moderated thread.
I thought that the greater responsibility of moderating lies on the Op of a self moderated thread.
If there is a bot that automatically scans and then reports posts for the attention of a moderator, it should be (and probably is) applied equally in all fairness regardless of whether the thread is self-moderated and/or member rank. I assume this is what is taking place. For example, Vod stated it has happens to him from time to time too.
The time difference is just 6 hours, that's why the moderator merge your post, if you post after 24 hours, your post wouldn't be merged.
I think there have been several that could have been merged because I deleted low quality posts and those from spammers. As you stated, many were from a long time ago hence the question if others had experienced similar patterns.
After reading about the bot from mprep, it became clear why it happened therefore locking the thread.