With my son participating in academy soccer for three years and closely observing their tournaments for the same period, it has become an ongoing theme.
It's because they have too many tournaments.
They are, BY FAR, the worst of any club when it comes to having their own teams be 70-100% of the teams in WSA tournaments. They probably charge their own teams to "showcase" them in glorified internal scrimmages.
I think that is kind of sick.
Every local club has about 50% of the entries to their own tournaments. I know TSC, at least the last couple of years we were there when they went to the all 1 fee payment each month instead of a monthly dues to the club and then a tournament fee to the club manager, TSC stopped "charging" their own teams to participate in their own tournaments. Those tournaments were among the most egregious when it came to ridiculous upcharges. I think U15 and above were part of the showcase and the entry fee was $1200 or so and it included "4th officials, player showcase info sheets, stats compiled, video of each match" 90% of the time the stats didn't compile correctly because only 60% of the match was captured on the VEO because the games all started late after the 1st game slot because the game slots were too close together and the referees didn't care if the next game was delayed because they needed more than a 5 minute break between games.
Blitz has a lot of Blitz teams in their tournaments BUT this last week there were a good number of outside teams from around OK, AR, KS, MO, and TX that attended. I even think there were a few from Louisiana.
But you're right, WSA tournaments probably up the host percentage of teams to about 75%. The timing is awful for their tournaments IMO. Labor Day and you're going up against the Plano tournament that I know Blitz and TSC like to send teams to and it also comes on the heels of the Edmond Beat the Heat tournament which a lot of teams like to use as their season tune up. Their Spring tournament is close to Memorial Day and I'm thinking a lot of teams are checked out or are gearing up for playoffs and other national tournaments...plus the holiday where everyone wants a break because school just ended.
I thought this showcase would be a good prep for me as a referee getting to do some higher level competitive games and getting ready for the HS season to start a couple weeks later. Instead I get parents bitching about everything because they were cold, the girls bitching because they were cold, and having to clear snow/ice from the turf at Scheel's. I've got WSA coaches yelling at other WSA coaches in game. The worst part of WSA tournaments, as a ref, is that they really don't think about the refs that much. TSC always had good food, access to trainers, good snacks and drinks and an area away from everyone. Blitz does a decent job of this too even though last weekend they really skimped on the snacks but worst was they didn't have any extra bottled water available for the refs in our area. WSA has the bare minimum for all of these and if you're scheduled on the south end of the complex, they don't have a tent set aside just for refs to chill and be out of the line of fire (I can't tell you how important this part is after coming off a game...you don't want to have to answer questions from U9 parents about what offside is and did the ref really make the right call).