Cutouts for Strip only, beneficial?

Cutouts will pick up power especially if the exhaust system is a bit undersized or restrictive to begin with for the size and HP of the engine. What's really important is to have the cutouts sufficiently downstream of the collectors to keep the secondary tuned length. Iirc around 30-44" depending on the effective RPM range of your engine. However if the pipes coming off the header collectors aren't the same diameter as the collectors (for example, immediately goes from 3" down to 2.5" like most systems) there's no secondary tuning happening anyway.