Team value is the total value of your players unless I am misstaken. If you look at your friends for example there is another value that is value of roster plus cash. I recon this is the value used by TE when seeding Cups etc.
I have created a guide that covers a lot of these issues, how to increase the value of your team as fast as possible etc, check it out at:
http://forum.topeleven.com/tutorials...s-players.html