When designers and marketers think outside the box, this is what you get: “I have a dream … that one day all Americans will join hands and declare their undying love for our balls.”

That’s how graphic artist Sam Ward began describing his vision for remaking the USA Today logo, the cornerstone of a rebranding campaign by America’s second-largest newspaper. And it only got worse from there. Sadly, USA Today chief marketing officer Maryam Banikarim liked Ward’s vision so much that she shared it in detail with the whole team, complete with repeated, anatomically suggestive references to “balls.”

The memo sounds like it was written by a teenage boy — one determined to ply his creative trade outside the box:

Whenever anyone steps outside the boundaries of the box it will create a stir. In fact, nothing good can be created without stepping outside the box. No, let me rephrase that; nothing can be created at all without stepping outside the box. Our balls could be our boldest statement; our chance to engage readers on a level that we currently are not doing.

The memo earned plenty of well-deserved scorn from readers of media reporter Jim Romenesko. Here are samples of the feedback on his Facebook page:

• “A CMO who thinks ’sophisticated’ readers will enjoy jokes about balls? What a boob! (Maybe they could let her go and hire a dozen reporters.)”
• “This is the same newspaper that sacked three veteran women staffers a few years ago because they dared to touch the “big blue ball” statue in one of the then-new Gannett towers out in Tysons Corner. Perhaps it’s a metaphor for that kind of ‘management’ and their recent “success.’”
• “As our boss wondered: Did we wake up and fast-forward to April 1?”
• “How much did they pay The Onion [a satire publication] to write this memo?”
• “Cue Beavis. ‘Heh, heh. He said “our balls.”‘”

Sam Ward and Maryam Banikarim, you are definitely “outsiders” — and that’s not a good thing.