Alright, now I'm stating to get the gist of this thread.
I think that if they were going to make a "Master Quest" to tide us over until
TP, they would release it around Christmas.
(Due to the fact that poor ol' Nintendo almost has
nothing big lined up for the holidays.)
Besides, they hyped us up to the point of insanity with
TP, and I doubt that they would just take all their work away and say,
"Here's a game that we didn't publicise at all! Have fun!.... Oh, and by the way, you aren't going to get
TP until next March. Sorry 'bout that, but you have
MM!"
It wouldn't be a good marketing strategy to publicise something, suddenly take it away, and then sell something unanounced.
As others have said, they delayed
TP because it hadn't reached the level they wanted. EA dropped us a few hints that this may happen even before the announcement, saying, "We're going to have to push it to get it in by the holidays."