I happen to work with Verizon and have also been told by many accounts that the phone is set to go on Pre-order this friday the 18th and will be available to the public on the 26th of Month. The reason that the phone has been delayed is that there were bugs within the software and verizon is wanting to roll the phone out using Lollipop 5.0. This is not going to be a big release and you will not be able to purchase the phone in the corporate stores as it is a limited release. It is also important to note that the phone will only be availble in Black as the white is on back order.
As for previous comments that the phone wont be rolled out this year is because reps/ Supervisors do not receive updates until a day prior. The only way this gets pushed back is if testers run into another problem. At this point we are being told we have the green light. Just so everyone knows the targeted date for Verizons Launch was December 3rd but got pushed back due to the bugs they wanted to work out. Hope this information helps.