Many figures have been prominent in the life of Teddy Atlas, the splendid trainer and ESPN boxing analyst. Here are some of the most significant:

19: The age at which he got into a knife fight with another Staten Island, New York, street punk that nearly ended his life.

400: The number of stitches needed to close the switchblade slash to his face.

1976: The year he began apprenticing under boxing guru Cus D'Amato in the Catskills, New York.

12: The age of juvenile delinquent Mike Tyson when Atlas took him under his wing.

.38: The caliber of the revolver Atlas jammed into Iron Mike's ear after the 14-year-old allegedly came on to the 11-year-old sister of Atlas' future wife, Elaine.

$800,000: The payday Atlas turned down in 1997 to train the increasingly untrainable Michael Moorer, whom he had guided to the I.B.F. and W.B.A. heavyweight titles in 1994.

The most important figure of all has been his father, Theodore Atlas Sr., who died in 1994. A family doctor who often slept with a stethoscope around his neck, the elder Atlas was known for giving away his time-and money-to his patients. He was also a man of stubborn principle: When teenage Teddy was arrested and charged with a felony, his old man initially refused to post the $40,000 bail to get him out of jail.

After resolving deep conflicts with his father, Teddy started a charity in 1997 in his name. The Dr. Theodore A. Atlas Foundation is an all-volunteer, community-service organization that helps those who, like the young and troubled Teddy, might otherwise be overlooked.

That brings us to two more figures:

$400,000: the amount the foundation brought in this year from a golf outing, a Golden Gloves tournament, and its 11th annual dinner on November 15 in Staten Island. The $200-a-plate affair attracted a parade of sports greats to meet and mingle with a thousand or so dinner guests. This year, Bill Parcells, John McEnroe, Larry Holmes, Arturo Gatti, and Evander Holyfield were on hand.

$3,000,000: The amount the foundation has quietly handed out to the types of people the elder Atlas would have helped in times of crisis.

Many of the downtrodden have been children. "We don't just mail out checks," says Atlas, who is 51. "When a request comes in from those in need, we send someone out to look around and decide what the person or family requires." Often, he goes himself. Atlas is, after all, a volunteer, as is everyone who works for the foundation.

That accounts for another figure:

100: The percentage of donations reaching the people for whom they were intended.

For every dollar donated, the best charities will use 80 cents or more toward their charitable purpose; the rest pays for administrative overhead, including fundraising. Many charities fronted by sports celebrities fail this test by a wide margin.

The foundation of superstar third baseman Alex Rodriguez supports mental health and other causes. But in 2005, only a third of its spending went to charitable works. That same year the Gary Payton Foundation garnered lots of photo ops for its N.B.A. namesake and amassed about $110,000 to benefit underprivileged youths. Yet less than $11,000 went to charitable programs-a measly 10 percent.
    
The Atlas Foundation is a no-frills, grassroots operation that's not strangled by bureaucracy. And its founder didn't get into philanthropy to burnish his image.

"Generosity is overrated," Atlas says. "Sometimes it's easy to give something, but when you have so much it don't mean nothing. And some people use that as a free ticket to make themselves seem more than they are, and look like they care about something they have no investment in."

This year, his foundation invested in a banister chairlift for a man who could no longer carry his cancer-stricken wife upstairs to bed at night; a ramp for a wheelchair-bound grade schooler; and books, paint, carpeting, a television, and a bedroom set for a mentally challenged 12-year-old with lymphoma who lives with his mother and grandmother on Social Security checks. "The only thing in the kid's room was a mattress," Atlas says. "We want him to experience life's comforts while he still has a chance."

Parents of children with muscular dystrophy have asked the Atlas Foundation for money to buy wheelchairs for their kids. "I get frustrated," he says, when a corporate charity turns them down because more than 90 percent of its money goes toward research and administrative costs. "My father used to say, ‘The bigger the hospital, the bigger the problems.'"

The mission of his small foundation is to aid as many people as it can, especially the ones with nowhere else to turn. "The destitute won't lose anything more if they come to us," he says, "and they'll still have their dignity and their pride."

This Atlas never shrugs.