Few fighters in recent memory have allowed us into their lives the way Dave Allen and Johnny Fisher have. They’ve taken a similar approach: a comedically self-deprecating tone, and barrierless interaction with the fanbase, both in terms of what they show the fans and in how they do so.

Allen and Fisher represent two of the most accessible and relatable characters to the median fan that we've seen on major broadcast platforms in some time.

Allen was, in some ways, a precursor to Fisher. In the pre-X days of Twitter in particular, Allen was conversant with the fanbase, letting people in on his daily indulgences and the garden training sessions to ward off their ill effects. Fisher formalized that process, upping the production value and essentially carrying out an ongoing online sitcom with his beloved father, welcoming everyone into his familial home.

In different ways, the two also have pulled the curtain back on the realities of being a fighter. Fisher and his family have, in particular, publicized the ticket-selling hustle that is necessary at the domestic level. Allen has revealed darker realities of the sport, in terms of his own battles with addiction, mental health and the economic realities of surviving off domestic-level boxing and hazardous sparring sessions.

In their own unique ways, Allen and Fisher have made fans care. How else could two domestic-level heavyweights fill up the Copper Box and main event on DAZN? Of course, there was the B-plot of settling the scoring controversy of their draw against one another in Saudi Arabia 147 days prior, but if correcting perceived injustices were in and of itself a selling feature, venues would be filled for boxing matches every single day of the week.

The fight was compelling because the people fighting were compelling. As much as titles and accolades matter, they can only matter so much as the people fighting for them matter to the paying audience.

Boxing promotion can often fall into a cozy pattern of selling events based on either the hardware on the line, or what's to come in the future for the winner. Broadly speaking, that's how anything is sold, how any story is told, by establishing stakes.

However, when the stakes, particularly rewards to be reaped in the future, are the only focus of a fight’s promotion, it can ignore the two things that make boxing events truly special: The people and the moment. Those are what make for an atmosphere, which becomes not only an enhancer to the fight, but almost a third character in the play.

As 8,000 sang every word to Savage Garden’s “Truly, Madly, Deeply,” and then did the same to the tune of “Take Me Home, Country Roads” by John Denver, it was hard not to feel like the fight that would begin once Fisher stepped into the ring and the singing stopped wasn’t the biggest event of the weekend, whether a title was on the line, or whether either fighter had the potential of winning one down the line or not.

The largely pro-Fisher crowd in attendance didn’t get the result they hoped for, but did get something memorable, a devastating left hook knockout from Allen. Allen spent the fight with a relaxed attitude, walking Fisher down with the laissez-faire forward-moving cadence one assumes in sparring when they aren’t particularly concerned about what their less experienced partner can do, knowing that enough pressure and rushed thought would produce damning fatigue or mistakes.

When he produced the knockout, he reacted calmly and compassionately, as if it was what he expected would happen, but also that he regretted that it had come to fruition.

As Fisher was face-first on the mat and later taking in oxygen through a mask, Allen motioned with his gloves for his team and fans in the audience to calm down, and aside from a polite raise of his arms in his corner once, resisted the urge to celebrate or anyone else celebrating him flattening his friend.

“I've been written off so many times, but I knew I had ability. At the right level, this level, I’m a handful,” Allen said during his in-ring post-fight interview. "There's lots of fights out there for me. I like boxing at my level, it's good. Competitive fights, I win some, lose some, this is what it's all about."

With his trademark transparency, Allen again peeled back the curtain in terms of what this fight was, what it wasn’t, but also about what fights should be about at their core.

Throughout the fight promotion, Allen resisted passive suggestions that the fight was a part of any kind of bracket funneling the winner towards world-level bouts. He and Fisher expressed satisfaction with the possibility of a career that would peak with winning the British title.

Boxing interviews end with a question in the vein of "who do you want next?" in the same cursory manner that conversations open with "how are you?" It's harmless convention, pure reflex at this point. However, it's a naturally tantalizing opportunity for proud fighters to make bold declarations about their future achievements. We want fighters to call out other fighters, to say something inflammatory, because it gives all of us something to talk about, and something for the promoters to sell.

But Allen's post-fight answers, in concert with the fight he just won and its promotion, proved that isn't always necessary at all. Fights "on this level," to borrow Allen’s verbiage, can be plenty compelling so long as the action and the people producing it are as well.

That isn’t to say, of course, that the spotlight should be taken off boxing's elite levels. But it is to say that as a live event and as broadcast entertainment, caliber of fighter and satisfaction are not always commensurate. Further, talent level and connection with the audience do not always go together either.

Provided the quality is on a reasonable level that isn’t visually amateurish, fights of a variety of levels can be broadly entertaining, so long as the audience connects with the fighters.

Domestic-level titles make for a recognizable and tidy format through which to contest these fights and unearth these personalities, as the UK marketplace frequently shows. There are fights at York Hall for titles representing the best fighter in a particular area of a city producing more gripping action and raucous crowds than some world title fights do.

Outside of the UK, there can often be a scoffing towards fights that aren't at the highest elite level. You hear it in the parlance towards fighters who lose even in world title fights as they’re derived as “bums” or “hype jobs,” suggestions that they were hoodwinking the public into believing in their abilities and profiting off that deception. Ultimately, this rubric doesn’t leave room for very many acceptable fighters in a sport that produces hundreds of fights per weekend across the globe.

Fighters can often be treated like action figures by media and fans, toys that we maneuver in our mind into future bouts. But fighters are human beings, and it’s when we allow them to be as much, with their flaws and limitations — professional and personal — on display, that boxing on any level can be tremendous theater.

To paraphrase Dave Allen: Competitive fights. You win some, you lose some. That’s what it’s all about. But if enjoying that competition requires the participants to be in the top 0.01% of fighters globally, you'd be missing out on some of the best fights, and the best nights the sport has to offer.