Thanks for the input so far, guys. I went and played a few 000s last night as well as an OM and a 0 (none of the shops I went to had 00s in stock), and came away with a few surprise thoughts.
Now I'm not sure I want a hog top. I played several spruce/rosewood combinations and really liked the richness in tone compared to the hog guitars I played. The spruce/rosewood guitars just really had a fuller tone. I knew that the hog bodied guitars would be a little crisper/tighter, which I thought I wanted, but now I'm not so sure. I even played a spruce/mahogany guitar that sounded great, but not as rich/full as the spruce/rosewood guitars I played.
I played a number of Martins from $1200-$5000 and none of the less expensive ones really felt "right" to me. The one I walked away liking the best was a 000-28ec Clapton model at $3500 (a little more than I wanted to spend).
This leaves me further concerned about whether the 00-15m or 000-15m would really feel right to me. I'm fairly picky when it comes to guitars, so buying unplayed leaves me concerned, as I mentioned in the OP.
By contrast, I felt like the Taylors were more consistent across the range of models. Is this just the Martins in my local shop, or have others noticed the same thing?
What are the best Martin 000 sized with spruce/rosewood in the $1000-1500 price range? I played a GC run of the 000-MMV guitars that didn't do much for me. I know these generally get good reviews, so maybe it was just the one in the shop.
I played several Martins with 1 3/4 nuts as well as several with the standard 1 11/16 nuts. Both felt good playing, but it was nice to have the extra string spacing at the bridge with the wider nuts. I'm not opposed to getting a 1 11/16 nut, but would lean towards the wider nut, if possible. I was ok with either the 24.9 scale or the 25.4 scale.