How does Timed Publishing work for new versions (updates) in Google Play?
I'm seeing the same behavior, except when I click "Start rollout to Production", I see a warning message saying, "Your app will now become available to all users of the Play Store. Do you want to continue?"..... Nooo, we want to use Timed Publishing! :-) So, I think Timed Publishing doesn't pertain to the first time you publish -- only to app updates.