Colorcubic has a nice 2-part series on how to make a basketball in Cinema 4D.

When people first get into modeling with a bit of confidence under their belts, they inevitably come to some objects that look simple to build but end up being hard. Take any sports ball for example. It’s just a sphere, right? Michael John (ColorCubic) shows how to make a basketball complete with its segments and bump pattern seen on its surface.

John uses a quick method to convert a sphere into a pattern of hexagons, as faces. Typically details like the hexagonal bumps of the basketball would be created with a bump map, but creating them by modeling is a great exercise to level up your skills. Stay tuned for part 2 which involves building the line segments of the ball.