Any other ways to delete thousands of empty playlists? Scripts did not work for me

The only other way I can think of is to hand-edit the .xml version of the library file and then use it to rebuild your main library files (losing some other metadata in the process).

Let's examine this in a bigger context. Is this truly a Match issue or is this in connection with the recent iTunes update and is a Music (not Match) issue? If the latter then you may find it easier to simply restart iTunes using an old library file. iTunes: How to re-create your iTunes library and playlists - https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201561 - These instructions have you open iTunes with an old iTunes library file archived at the time you last updated iTunes. This will revert your library content list and appearance to what it was at the date indicated on the file. Newer media not in this list will still be in your media folder. You can re-add these by dragging your media folders to the Automatically Add To iTunes folder but they will regarded as brand new items.

Your library file and your media are two separate things. The library file is basically a catalog of what media it thinks exist on the computer and where they are. It does not always correspond 100%. So you can re-start using an older library file and not re-download any media because you are just using an old catalog file to reference the media which has remained unchanged.

There isn't a NAS involved in this somewhere it there?

Network Server, I think you would know if you had one. It is an extended version of an external hard drive which makes the drive its own sort of independent file system on a network. Some are prone to strange behavior with iTunes.