In terms of Stamkos and the Leafs, there's a couple of things that indicate he may be more amenable to coming home than Tavares.
STAMKOS ANGLE:
Tavares has openly stated that he wants to do the whole Joe Sakic/Steve Yzerman thing on Long Island. Stamkos has never given us any indication that this is what he intends to do.
Stamkos stated that he wanted the Leafs to tank and draft him back in 2008 leading up to the draft.
Stamkos trains with Gary Roberts, who is a Leaf alumni and famously one of the last GTA area guys to come home and make a major impact. He also helped bring Joe Nieuwendyk home for a year. If anyone is a good example of a successful hometown return, it's him.
In 2011, Stamkos said he was surprised he didn't receive offer sheet attention on the market, which I'd identify as his rich hometown team with a big hole at center.
Stamkos eventually signed for a 5 year contract, which takes him to unrestricted free agency and not a year over. This looks a little short in comparison to the 6-8 year deals Tavares, Seguin, Doughty, Hall, RNH, Karlsson, and other high first round picks. Also, you have to consider this was before the second lockout, so he could have easily signed some ridiculous 11 year deal if he wanted.
I think he stated somewhere that if the Lightning couldn't win a cup he'd be cheering for the Leafs or some obvious statement last year. It was a Cabbie interview, but saying something like that is still kind of unusual.
He liked the Lebron/Leafs/Stamkos article, which seems innocent enough, until you think about how savvy pro athletes are today. Even if he isn't necessarily packing his bags to come home and selling the condo right away, this sends a message to Tampa that maybe all is not well in their arrangement.
TAMPA BAY ANGLE
Tampa is building a really nice program with Yzerman at the helm, but let's face it, their track record with keeping their star players is quite poor. Brad Richards, Dan Boyle, Nikolai Khabibulin were all dumped from their cup winning team under difficult economic times. Richards and Boyle have been rumored to go back to Tampa over the years but it's never happened. Richards picked NYR the first go round, and signed a discount deal to go to Chicago, two Original Six markets, rather than return to Tampa. Boyle chose New York this past summer.
Lecavalier and St. Louis were thought to be lifers until they weren't... In a matter of one calendar year, the Lightning have moved on from two of their captains.
TORONTO ANGLE
We still have a big hole at center, we still have a ton of money in the vault, and we now have Tim Leiweke who made a big financial splash to fix TFC, and Brendan Shanahan, who is building a new program. We also have a centennial coming up in 2016-17 and a fiftieth cup anniversary drought looming that year.
This past winter, it was reported that Lieweke could be looking at Stamkos as a signature addition to his regime.
It's interesting that the Leafs have avoided big ticket free agents this year. Maybe they're saving some cap space and trying to remain flexible for a big fish? What better way than to go about things than to quietly continue to build a good team and supercharge it with a Stamkos addition two summers from now? It's all fun conspiracy theory stuff for now, but hopefully we have a nice surprise in store for us...