We can deny it because we can actually go see his TOI and when that TOI was happening and see that either you, or your memory, are exaggerating how long he kept that role.
But it doesn't really matter that much because we can all get behind the idea that Neal sucked last year. It just makes sense that a guy joining his third team in three years who is a binge scorer anyway, would suck after two short-as-can-be offseasons. Where as Lucic has sucked 5v5 for many years in a row now and his "binge periods" are like, a week tops (he scored most of his goals last year in January for the Oilers). Neal is probably going to outscore him by 10 goals even if he misses the last 30 games.
Although I think it would be mildly hilarious if Lucic managed to score 10 goals, Neal missed the rest of the year and Calgary didn't even get the conditional third.
The miscalculation that the Flames made in signing Neal was thinking that because he was a 20-goal scorer, that he could add 20 goals to the team. What I think everyone finds out about Neal after having him for a few seasons is that Neal doesn't add goals to the lineup. Neal gets his 20 goals only when it is made a priority. The Flames had absolutely zero motivation to prevent Neal from scoring. They signed him specifically because they wanted him to add goals in the top six and help their top players make more of an offensive impact. The idea that the Flames were standing in Neal's way from scoring is ridiculous, because James Neal scoring was their goal from the start.
The Flames gave Neal the chance on the top line like they had imagined in the summer, and that line got killed. Can't score goals if you're never in the offensive zone. That line was godly with Lindholm. So obviously they stuck with Lindholm without letting the experiment go too long. They still gave Neal time on the top PP, despite no real success with it. They tried him on the second line, but that line got killed with him on it, so again, he wasn't scoring 20 goals there. On the third, he finally had a matchup where sometimes, he could be in the offensive zone and get some chances. What Neal and several fans and media members don't seem to understand is that the rate at which Neal got good scoring chances actually went up when he dropped to the bottom six. He still wasn't able to bury most of the time, but it was still in his best interest, and the team's. I do wonder if things would have been very different if Neal didn't have such unsustainably poor shooting ability all season long. 20 goals likely wasn't going to happen, but if he was able to have a hot streak where he consistently buried his chances (similar to early this season) at any point last season, maybe he wouldn't have spiraled into bitterness and lack of accountability.