The movie was later re-issued theatrically stateside in the USA on a double bill with Enter the Dragon (1973).
The film was ''from the producers of the Bruce Lee martial-arts classic Enter the Dragon (1973)'' according to 1980s home video sleeve notes. The movie's star Jim Kelly had co-starred with Lee in this earlier picture.
Though he was reprising his role of the title character from the precursor picture Black Belt Jones (1974), Jim Kelly's ''Black Belt Jones'' character is simply and only known in this movie as "Jones" in both the film and in its credits.
According to 'Every '70s Movie', ''...the confusion over whether 'Hot Potato' is a real sequel to Black Belt Jones (1974) is compounded by the existence of a totally unrelated Jim Kelly movie called The Tattoo Connection (1978), which is sometimes deceptively marketed as 'Black Belt Jones 2' [and/or 'Black Belt Jones 2: The Tattoo Connection']''.
Director Robert Clouse was deaf and was reliant on his assistant directors to her the dialogue and verify that it had been delivered effectively as was done on his other pictures.