Eric - you probably already know this but for the SoCal newbies, I cannot stress enough how important it is for travel ball teams to have tryouts as early as possible in August. By the time the third week of tryouts happen, most of the talent is watered down and the better players have already committed to teams. For example, My DD had two different tryouts on August 6th & 7th (many got offers that weekend), they picked final teams on the 14th and already had their first practice earlier this week. One of the good players we picked up (2nd base) was going to attend a tryout this weekend at her older sister's TB org but liked our program and the girls so much she won't even attend this weekend's tryouts she was scheduled to attend. This is fairly typical.
I am aware of this. I don't set the team schedules, but I agree with your points.