Every post in this thread is excellent and demonstrates the collective wisdom of the site.
I think playing close to home is a personal decision that does not necessarily have a right or wrong answer. The Jr. Day allows a student to find out if that particular campus and location is "personally" right for them and their faimily's respective circumstances.
I can offer some long distance perspective. We are obviously from Cleveland and my son played 750 miles away near Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. For his goals, we felt it was imperative to play in the south. We typically travelled four times per year there - once in the fall and three times in the spring. Also, I am guessing we actually saw about 80% of all his games (the last two years anyways) on Internet video. Is video the same as being there in person? - of course not. Is it a pretty good substitute? - I think so. Even without the video, my son would have made the same choice and we would have supported him. I should add, that before video there was audio. Baseball is a cool sport in that regard. We have found that listening to a game is a very satisfying experience as well.