For 14 years, we’ve patiently awaited the release of the best (only good) poker movie of all-time, Rounders. Unfortunately, the IMDB.com page for Rounders 2 says that the movie won’t be ready for its previously scheduled release date of 2012, but rather 2014 now. But what’s a couple more years after waiting almost one and a half decades?

At least we can only hope it will be two more years because there’s been some questionable statements coming from The Weinstein Company, which is the producer of Rounders 2. Owner Henry Weinstein was quoted as saying, “It’s become much more of a theatrical business because the movie has to work in theaters. There’s no second chance….I never make sequels but it’s something I’d like to revisit.”

This definitely contradicts what he originally said when planning the sequel after stating, “I’m entertaining the idea of doing a Rounders sequel because there’s a side of the story that we haven’t told. I want to do it because there’s something that we didn’t say.”

Going back to Weinstein’s comments about movies having to work in theaters, his main fear is that Rounders 2 will be just like the original – a mediocre box office performer that excelled in DVD sales. Unfortunately, with all of the online piracy out there, DVD sales have fallen considerably, so The Weinstein Company would have little to fall back on if Rounders 2 didn’t do well in the theaters.

One good thing worth mentioning in all of this is that Matt Damon and Edward Norton are expected to come back as we mentioned before. Damon played “Mike McDermott,” who was embarking on a WSOP trip when Rounders left off. Norton, or “Worm” in the movie, was still in New York City, but it’d only be logical if they met back up in a sequel. Initial plans also claimed that Leonardo DiCaprio would be in the Rounders sequel, but we’ll have to see how that pans out.

After a fairly successful inaugural year, the Epic Poker League has suddenly found itself a new suitor in Pinnacle Entertainment. Apparently, Pinnacle has been in talks with Jeffrey Pollack and the Palms Casino about purchasing the Epic Poker League. While little is known about the potential deal, it’s supposed to be finished within 60 days – assuming the deal does get completed.

This is certainly news to most people since the EPL appeared to be doing much better than expected. But according to Wicked Chops Poker, the suspected reason for why the poker league pushed both their fourth event and $1 million freeroll back to TBA April/May dates is that they’re having some financial difficulties. The Epic Poker League, on the other hand, claims that it’s because players were asking that the events be pushed back.

In any case, it sounds like Pinnacle Entertainment is pretty serious about adding the EPL to their list of assets. Currently they own casinos in Indiana, Louisiana, Missouri, Nevada and Ohio.

Apparently, some of the top brass at Pinnacle used to work with Jeffrey Pollack at Harrah’s Entertainment, which is a big reason why this potential deal has arisen. More specifically, Pinnacle marketing director Ginny Shanks helped Pollack run the WSOP, and also worked with him at Harrah’s Entertainment.

Assuming this deal did go through, it would be interesting to see where where the loud-mouthed EPL Commissioner Annie Duke would end up. She’s constantly been touting the league and herself through papers and interviews whenever the chance arises – much to the annoyance of most of the poker community. Of course, before anything happens with Duke or anyone else, we’ll need to see a deal go through first.

If you pay much attention to the NFL, you’ve no doubt heard American football quarterback Tim Tebow’s name mentioned a time or two. The golden boy took Denver from a dismal 1-4 record, to the top of the AFC West division and a playoff berth. Apparently, Tebow has become so popular that nefarious people are using his name to promote their alleged poker tournaments.

Our story begins with somebody under the twitter name “BigMoneyPoker” tweeting numerous poker pros with the following message:

BigMoneyPoker Amy Sandoval
@basebaldy Plz RT to show your support tebow playing poker for @AmericanCancer charity before the coloradopokerchampionship.com main event!

The first red flag about the Colorado Poker Championship is that, when you visit the website’s front page, you’re seeing the one and only page. Now I’m not saying this immediately means it’s a phony poker event, but definitely something to think about. Furthermore, the NFL is pretty leery about their players competing in charity poker tournaments, and devout religious fanatic Tim Tebow doesn’t exactly seem like the first person to go against the grain here.

In addition to this, it should be mentioned that the BigMoneyPoker twitter account is listed under Amy Sandoval, who’s supposedly a philanthropist, model, cheerleader, charity promoter and poker player – what a catch! Unfortunately, it’s questionable as to whether or not Sandoval really exists since she has never been on the poker radar in the past, and is spamming people like crazy. Plus her picture shows one of those slutty-girl-on-bed poses that people often use when they set up a fake Facebook or twitter account.

When you add it all together, I doubt you’ll see Tim Tebow showing up for the Colorado Poker Championship. Furthermore, it’s questionable what you really will find when you arrive at the supposed location of this mysterious poker event.

Earlier this year, we ran a story about how researchers tested monkey poker players to see if they possessed any skills on the felt. Interestingly enough, the Wolfgang Köhler Primate Research Center discovered that monkeys actually have the ability to figure out what other poker players are thinking. It appears as if monkey gambling is in full effect again since the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics put various primates through some interesting studies.

Rather than playing poker, this time the apes were gambling for pieces of fruit while choosing from upside-down cups that had been shuffled. This has been a popular game for centuries among humans, but until now, few realized that monkeys could play it too.

The primates could either play the game in hopes of picking the correct cup and winning a large piece of fruit, or they could take a guaranteed piece of fruit instead. When there were fewer cups on the table, most of the apes gambled to win a large piece of fruit. However, when researchers added a lot more cups to the game, which lowered the monkeys’ odds of winning, they wisely took the guaranteed piece of fruit.

The only exception to the latter is when the gambled fruit prize was so much larger than the guaranteed fruit that the apes couldn’t resist; this showed they have a strong ability to know when a big prize outweighs taking lowered odds.

It’s pretty incredible to see that monkeys have the ability to comprehend the complex thought process that humans go through when making gambling decisions. Furthermore, primates are the only form of life that can do this besides humans. And the way I’ve seen some humans play poker, monkeys might even make better gambling decisions.

With just a few days left in 2011, this seems like the appropriate time to do one of those cheesy ‘best poker stories of the year’ posts. So without further delay, here are some of the top stories that went down in the poker world this past year.

Erik Seidel obliterates the competition – For decades, Erik Seidel has been one of the premier poker players in the world, having got his start in the 80′s when poker wasn’t even cool. Even still, few could have foreseen the domination he would show in 2011 after winning several major poker tournament titles along with $6.5 million. Seidel’s unbelievable year, which included an Aussie Millions $250k High Roller win, an LA Poker Classic title, the NBC Heads-Up Championship crown, a Five Diamond Classic High Roller title, and numerous other near-wins might be the best year ever for a tournament player.

Phil Hellmuth’s Comeback – In a day and age where poker strategy is available to pretty every schmuck, it seems as if every amateur and semi-professional grinder has become an expert. And the recent assessment of Phil Hellmuth by these “experts” is that the game has passed him by. But suddenly, it was like Hellmuth heard these naysayers, and experienced a career revival at the 2011 WSOP. He finished second in three high-profile championship events, and restored his reputation in the process. Unfortunately, bracelet #12 still eludes him.

Triple Crown Winners – It’s tough enough winning one major poker tournament title…let alone a WSOP, WPT and EPT title (triple crown). Before this year, only Roland De Wolfe and Gavin Griffin had managed to win poker’s triple crown. However, both Bertrand Grospellier and Jake Cody managed to join this elite club after completing the last leg of the journey. Grospellier won the $10k Seven Card Stud Championship, while Cody won the WSOP Heads-Up Championship in 2011.

Welcome Epic Poker League – At first, I thought the Epic Poker League was a terrible idea because part of the allure of poker is that amateurs, in theory, can rise to become pros. And the EPL takes a totally different approach because only 200 professional players are invited to compete in the league, much like golf’s PGA. So far, the EPL is proving me wrong, and had a pretty successful initial year.

Pius Heinz wins 2011 WSOP Main Event – Few would’ve put their money on 22-year-old Pius Heinz to win the 2011 WSOP Main Event since he came onto the final table with the second smallest chip stack. However, Heinz showed plenty of resolve as he maneuvered through the final nine players, and onto the $8.7 million top prize after defeating Martin Staszko heads-up.