The Wowhead team discovered that Arena Season 9 begins on December 14. That means we could possibly have our hands on the expansion on December 7.

UPDATE: Wowhead has pointed us toward another important bit of information! Looks like Blizzard's been teasing us with the Cataclysm date all along. In April's Azeroth Bulletin, Doc Cogspin says the chance of any cataclysmic event taking place in the foreseeable future is "less than 12.7%." 12/7! Sneaky!

All sorts of rumored dates for the Cataclysm launch have been flying around the web lately. Numerous dates in November and December (and even early January) have been mentioned, but our friends at Wowhead think they have discovered a plausible answer: December 7.

So why that specific date? While digging through the game files for the next patch, they found this snippet of text: "Arena battles and Rated Battlegrounds are only available during an active player versus player combat season. Season nine will begin on December 14th, so be prepared at that time to take your shot at glory!"

Zarhym recently said on the official forums that "The next Arena Season will begin for level-85 players approximately one week after the official launch of World of Warcraft: Cataclysm." So if Season 9 begins on December 14, that means Cataclysm will come out on December 7.

Just to be clear: This has not been confirmed. However, Wowhead's detective work seems to support their findings. We'll just have to wait and see if they're right. What do you think?