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Lou Piniella trudged through the visitors' dugout after exiting the interview room and slowly walked across the Wrigley Field grass toward his own clubhouse, barely acknowledging shouts of "Tomorrow, Lou! Tomorrow!" from stragglers in the stands.

It was a far cry from the sounds the Chicago Cubs and their manager heard a half-hour earlier, when the first game of their National League Division Series ended with Alfonso Soriano hitting a soft liner that was cradled by James Loney.

That wasn't "Loooo" the fans were saying, in other words. What do you expect after 100 years without a World Series?

In a sign of how high the expectations are for the Cubs, they were serenaded by boos after a 7-2 loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers that reinforced exactly why this city hasn't gone head over heels yet at the thought of both the Cubs and Chicago White Sox being in the playoffs at the same time.

"Invariably, when you keep putting people on, you're going to score at times," said Piniella, who received a disappointing outing from starting pitcher Ryan Dempster of Gibsons, B.C.

"They scored quickly, there. With the grand slam."

Dempster tied his career high with seven walks in 4 2/3 messy innings, throwing 109 pitches, just 57 for strikes.

He walked the bases loaded in the fifth inning, then gave up a grand-slam home run to Loney — the first by a Dodgers hitter in postseason play since Dusty Baker in Game 2 of the 1977 NL Championship Series.

The key walk came on a seven-pitch battle with Manny Ramirez after the Dodgers slugger fell behind 0-2.

"I felt really good out there all night, maybe too fine," said Dempster, who was 14-3 at Wrigley this year en route to joining fellow Canadian John Hiller as the only pitchers to follow up a 25-save season with 17 wins.

"When you fall behind, you put yourself in a position where you're constantly trying to make pitches."

Ramirez hit his 25th career postseason homer on an 0-2 pitch from reliever Sean Marshall in the seventh inning that was down around the tops of Ramirez's shoes and ended up halfway up the bleachers in centre field.

Dodgers catcher Russell Martin of Montreal, by way of Toronto, also collected his first postseason homer, which led off the ninth inning.

But it was Ramirez's walk that had Dempster talking — and might serve as an indication the Dodgers have acquired one of the traits of manager Joe Torre's old New York Yankees teams: an unflinching approach that tries to wear down pitchers.

"I thought [Ramirez] was chasing on the first two pitches, but he didn't the rest of the at-bat," said Dempster, who then walked Andre Ethier before giving up Loney's grand slam. "He laid off pitches and then he walked and then there was another walk after that and. ... Seemed like there were a whole lot of walks, didn't it?"

The Dodgers hitters were hardly light-headed, making the Cubs throw 184 pitches, compared to 147 by their L.A. counterparts.

"I don't think [Dempster] was missing by a lot," said Torre, whose starter, Derek Lowe, scattered seven hits over six innings, striking out six and walking one while using his heavy sinker to get two early inning-ending double plays.

"Our game is to make the pitcher work and be patient," Torre said. "We weren't that way earlier in the year, and sometimes we strayed, but [last night] I thought that considering it was the first game of the division series ... I thought we showed a great deal of patience, even [down] 2-0."

Mark DeRosa's two-run homer gave the Cubs that early lead, but Lowe was largely impenetrable. He was particularly hard on Cubs leadoff hitter Soriano and No. 2 batter Kosuke Fukodome, who combined to go 0-for-9 with three strikeouts.

"He pitched a great game, kept his composure early when he could have lost it," said Martin, who was practically smothering Loney in the dugout after the grand slam. "I screamed so loud I got light-headed."

The second game of the best-of-five series is tonight at Wrigley Field, with Cubs starter Carlos Zambrano facing Chad Billingsley of the Dodgers.