It’s a long way from the Tulsa, Okla., to Adairsville, but Bobby Cox has had plenty of time to make the adjustment.

Cox, who led the Atlanta Braves to a baseball World Series Championship in 1995, has a 48-acre farm in Adairsville where he and his wife, the former Pam Boswell of Rome, call home much of the time nowadays. (They also have a home in Marietta.)

Since he retired as the fourth winningest manager in baseball history, Cox has hardly had time to look back. Bobby Cox the future baseball Hall of Famer has become Bobby Cox the businessman.

“I’ve been more busy after I retired than when I was working,” Cox said after a meeting with the Adairsville Council of the Cartersville-Bartow County Chamber of Commerce recently.

Cox has been appointed skipper, er, chairman of the board of the Northside Bank. He is a also a partner in the LakePoint Sporting Community and Town Center project, and when he is not working with the bank or the massive sports-based development in Emerson, he and his wife are involved in a number of charity projects, particularly the Homeless Pets Foundation.

“I’m learning a little bit about the business world right now. It’s not as easy as I thought,” Cox said.

His friend Orlando Wilson, a former TV fisherman, brought Cox into the banking business eight years ago.

“Orlando Wilson was the chairman of the board, and well, we thought it was a great idea,” Cox said. “As you know there have been a lot of failures in the state of Georgia with banks in the last few years, but ours has been hanging tough.”

He was appointed chairman of the board earlier this year, and Cox feels his role is to keep it energized.

“It’s very easy to tire as a board member, after eight years we’ve lost some,” Cox said.

Recruiting new leadership is at the top of his to-do list.

“We want to keep strong leadership. We have a great office staff in place. We have two branches beside our Adairsville location, and we’re starting to do pretty darn good,” said Cox.

His good friend Ned Yost, who for many years was Cox’s third base coach with the Braves but currently serves as manager of the Kansas City Royals, brought him into the LakePoint development.

“I thought it was another good idea, and we’re coming along pretty darn good,” Cox said. “We’re not there yet, but we have a lot of private financing going on right now and hopefully going to break ground here in another month or so.”

LakePoint will include 16 baseball fields, all featuring artificial turf manufactured by Dalton-based Shaw Industries. Perfect Game USA agreed to move its youth baseball operations from Iowa to Bartow County. It’s the largest operator of so-called “traveling team” baseball tournaments in the country.

Atlanta-based regional lacrosse and soccer groups have also signed on to base their operations at LakePoint.

“We expect four million people to pass through (annually) once it’s all built out,” Cox said. “I think it’s going to work out. With that many people passing through, it’s got to be pretty darned good for Bartow County.”

Cox holds the major league record for ejections, being tossed out of 158 regular season and three post season baseball games. It’s a sure bet none of his associates are going to ask him to leave his current projects anytime soon.