The single-season contract looks suspicious, especially on a franchise so familiar with carpetbaggers. Brendan Shanahan, the Rangers’ latest aging addition, sought to allay any such concerns.

“I’d like to stay, I’ll say that,” said Shanahan, whose signing with the Rangers was broken exclusively by the Post’s Larry Brooks on Sunday.

“In a way, it’s me coming in here and saying to the fans and saying to Glen [Sather] and Tom [Renney], take a look and see if you like what I have,” Shanahan said. “I don’t want to do this to my family every summer.

“If I had an opportunity to stay here to the end of my career, and that was something I wanted and the Rangers wanted, it’s something that could potentially happen. I didn’t leave Detroit to go to a different team every summer.

“If they chose to extend me, I’d be thrilled to get that.”

The NHL’s leading active goal-scorer (598), 15th all-time, the 37-year-old left wing potted 40 last season for the Red Wings, his best since scoring 41 in 1999-2000. His 81 points were his best since notching 88 in 1996-97, when traded from Hartford to Detroit.

As high a draft pick as the Devils ever had, taken second overall in 1987, Shanahan left New Jersey for St. Louis as a restricted free agent in 1991, with Scott Stevens awarded as compensation. Shanahan said the Devils called him when he became a free agent July 1, but that negotiations never developed. He said the final decision was among Detroit, Montreal and the Rangers.

“The safest choice for me would have been to stay in Detroit,” Shanahan said. “Even on a bad night they’ll remember a Stanley Cup-winning goal I scored, or a big goal I scored 10 years ago and cut me some slack for the gray I have in my hair.

“Aside from what I do on the ice, I just thought I could add to the team. A lot of people were surprised when I went to Latvia for Team Canada. They had a very young team and were looking for a veteran player to come over and captain the team. I thought it was so great to have a chance to impact the careers of these young players. I owe a lot of veteran players for my career, when I was 18, 19, 20, when I got off track they nudged me back on track.”

So Shanahan will try to do what so many of the greatest aging transplants – from Howie Morenz to Doug Harvey to Phil Esposito to Marcel Dionne to Wayne Gretzky – couldn’t manage: Succeed in New York, with Mark Messier the glaring exception.

“Would it have been better to come here when I was 18 years old instead of 37? Probably. But that’s not the case,” Shanahan said. “I still feel, besides what I do on the ice, there a lot of ways I can help this organization.”

Scoring 40 would be a start. Broadway loves a goal-getter.

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More than two dozen Rangers youngsters, including Marc Staal, will face similar squads from seven other franchises in a Michigan camp in early September, just before training camp opens. Goalie Al Montoya is expected to test his repaired shoulder there, although he may not play. . . . The Rangers’ exhibition in Puerto Rico vs. the Panthers is still up in the air.