There are many references to the various movies from the "Rocky" franchise as well as characters from those movies, namely Rocky, Apollo, Clubber Lang and Ivan Drago.
During the shooting of this episode, only seven movies in the Rocky franchise had been released (Rocky, Rocky II, Rocky III, Rocky IV, Rocky V, Rocky Balboa, and Creed). That is why this episode is titled "Rocky 8". The eighth movie in the Rocky franchise, "Creed 2" was released just two months before this episode aired.
This first of a handful of episodes that Sasha Roiz guest stars in. Years earlier, his co-star on the television series "Grimm" (2011) Russel Hornsby himself guest starred as a character named Quentin Sainz.
Thomas Kessler finds it weird that Donna wants him to hire someone who went to SUNY Buffalo. All state colleges in NY are SUNY. There are two in Buffalo that it could be. The University of Buffalo or U.B. And Buffalo State College or Buff State.